Yield Guild Games: Community Update — Q1 2025
The first few months of 2025 saw YGG unveil its Metaverse Filipino Worker campaign, publish its Perspectives in Play report, and roll out significant upgrades to the Guild Advancement Program (GAP).
The early stages of the year also saw members of the YGG core team make appearances at high-profile events around the world, including ACTAI APAC, NVIDIA GTC, and GDC 2025. GDC was a particularly active stretch for YGG, where the team co-hosted the side event Web3 @ GDC with thirdweb and unveiled YGG’s first game, LOL Land.
Catch up on the rest of YGG’s wins from Q1 2025 in the latest YGG Community Update. Read the full report here: YGG Community Update Q1 2025.
Unpacking the Future of Web3 Gaming at GDC 2025
Coming off its offsite, which brought the YGG global team together in person in Sonoma County for strategy meetings and team-building activities, YGG co-hosted Web3 @ GDC with thirdweb to kick off its presence at GDC 2025. The event brought together leaders from gaming ecosystems, VC firms, and game studios, who participated in candid discussions on how Web3 should proceed amid the FUD surrounding the industry.
The fireside chat between YGG co-founder Gabby Dizon and Limit Break’s Gabe Leydon was the highlight of the day, with Leydon arguing that the current Web3 model is dominated by centralized exchanges and traders. He introduced the idea of “Apptokens” as a programmable solution to give developers more control over game economies, allowing them to manage token liquidity and enforce creator royalties.
YGG also attended prominent AI events held across California to explore novel ways AI can help create new economic opportunities for the YGG community. YGG co-founder Beryl Li, Head of Operations and Future of Work Trish Rosal, and other members of the YGG core team attended NVIDIA GTC, one of the world’s premier AI events, for the first time. Beryl and Trish represented YGG at ETH San Francisco and the Stanford Blockchain AI Summit as well.
GDC also saw YGG announce its first game LOL Land at WolvesDEN Alpha Night, hosted by WolvesDAO. As of April 2025, over 50,000 gamers have pre-registered for the game, eager to explore YGG’s debut title.
New Upgrades to the Core YGG Experience
The conclusion of GAP Season 8 also marked the end of the pilot run of Onchain Guilds, which saw the first wave of Onchain Guilds join the YGG ecosystem. Over the season’s nearly eight-week run, 75 communities signed up to become Onchain Guilds, with 49 enrolling in and completing at least one guild quest.
GAP Season 8 began on November 15, 2024, and wrapped on January 8, 2025, to another strong reception from the YGG community. This reflected in the season’s activity metrics: 21,452 questers in total signed up to take on the latest set of GAP quests, with 95% of all questers completing and submitting at least one quest.
In GAP Season 9, YGG continued iterating on its rewards distribution process. The season saw the launch of a brand-new Rewards Map, offering more YGG and RON token prizes, as well as an airdrop for all questers from GAP Season 8. The Stake House also remained popular into the new GAP season, with YGG increasing the maximum possible multiplier that stakers can earn. Big-time stakers saw as high as a 5x multiplier on their YGG points throughout the season.
Perspectives in Play Report
During the YGG Play Summit, communications agency Emfarsis conceptualized the Leaders Roundtables and facilitated the roundtable discussions at the YGG Play Summit in Manila, Philippines, over November 21–22, 2024, to inform a trends report focused on two pertinent topics in Web3 gaming: key opinion leaders (KOLs) and web3-native user acquisition strategies.
The sessions brought together a diverse cohort to share their industry perspectives. Attendees represented organizations including Animoca Brands, The Sandbox, CCP Games, Infinity Ventures Crypto (IVC), Sky Mavis, HyperPlay, YGG, and many more. Participants were selected to ensure a broad and balanced representation of the Web3 gaming ecosystem. The group included startup founders, game developers, content creators, guild leaders, journalists, esports professionals, investors, and other experts, spanning various levels of seniority.
In Q1, YGG published the full Perspectives in Play report after carefully reviewing the discussions that took place during the YGG Play Summit. The report aimed to reflect the diversity of voices among the Leaders Roundtable participants, capturing both the candid tone of the discussions and the bold questions leaders posed to their peers.
The full Perspectives in Play report is now available for download: bit.ly/2025YGGPerspectivesInPlay
Introducing the Metaverse Filipino Worker
Early in Q1, YGG Pilipinas released the Metaverse Filipino Worker (MFW) on YouTube. A follow-up to the viral 2021 hit Play-to-Earn: NFT Gaming in the Philippines, the short film showcases the real-life stories of Filipinos who have built digital careers in the open Metaverse. The MFW film garnered over a million views in less than two weeks of its launch.
A play on the term Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW), MFWs refer to Filipinos who seek better earning opportunities within the Metaverse. This movement has enabled thousands of Filipinos to work from home for the first time in their lives on a flexible schedule, all while earning a globally competitive wage. In previous years, these same Filipinos would have gone abroad, sacrificing time with their loved ones to provide for them.
To bring the message of MFW to the provinces of the Philippines, YGG Pilipinas announced the MFW Caravan. This traveling roadshow will make multiple stops throughout the Philippines, working together with the YGG Pilipinas Metaversity program to educate even more Filipinos on how to get started building their careers in Web3.
Read the full report here: YGG Community Update Q1 2025
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